


look at what you missed

by gendernoncompliant



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: AU where Nathan's trouble goes away, Chronic Pain, Established Relationship, F/M, I talk a lot about yoga for someone who's never done yoga, M/M, Polyamory, Trans Character, hurt/comfort af, something of a character study, trans man Nathan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-25
Updated: 2019-09-25
Packaged: 2020-10-27 19:48:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20765975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gendernoncompliant/pseuds/gendernoncompliant
Summary: Losing his trouble was supposed to be a blessing, but Nathan’s body feels even less real than it did when it existed in a vacuum. The pain is so much worse.





	look at what you missed

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little thought I had to get out. Big thanks to @crownedcarl who brought up the idea of Nathan being uncomfortable and touch-avoidant when his trouble is finally gone.
> 
> EDIT: I was never happy with the title of this fic, so I swapped it to some lyrics from the song "Silver Platters" by Les Gold. This fic was previously called Outside Himself.

Losing his trouble was supposed to be a blessing. Nathan spent years fantasizing about it, down to the smallest detail—the sun, the cold bite of a brass doorknob in winter, cheap carpet under his feet, scratchy wool sweaters. He used to lie in bed, running his hands over the comforter and watching it crumple under the touch, trying to remember what texture it was. It was exercise that always seemed to hurt more than it helped, but he did it anyway.

In those twenty-seven years between bouts of the troubles, Haven was a sleepy, quiet place. Working at Haven PD was all paperwork and civil disputes—the occasional thrill of a petty theft or two to liven up the place. But when the troubles came back, things got violent. Dangerous. Nathan took a lot of hits with no real way of knowing how bad they were.

Duke used to start fights over it. Even when things were bad between them, Duke was overbearing. He always jumped to the worst possible scenario, always thought something was broken when it wasn’t. Once, in a frustrated rage, Duke had told him that he’d regret ignoring all of it when his feeling finally did come back.

He was right.

The novelty of feeling the breeze or whatever sure wears off quick when your body becomes a lighthouse of old pains and poorly healed wounds. All at once, it becomes incredibly obvious how often he must have walked around on a sprained ankle or thrown out his back and without taking any time off. Even with nothing new, his joints creak, his mobility drops overnight. His body feels even less real than it did when it existed in a vacuum. The pain is so much worse.

Duke starts teaching him yoga. He doesn’t take to it right away. Even the easy poses make him feel clumsy and weak. Duke makes him focus on his breathing and doesn’t let him duck out of it and eventually they settle into a routine. He comes by a couple times a week after work and lets Duke talk him through poses and meditative breathing and he doesn’t always like it, but it makes him feel more in control. Less like a passenger in his own body.

He never meant to, but Nathan built a lot of his identity around being invulnerable. Unhurtable. It made him feel safe in a way that, growing up trans in a small town, he’d never really felt before. He doesn’t feel safe, anymore, but Duke’s voice is low and grounding and sometimes he forgets the ache while he’s here with him. Just for a little while.

Duke’s counting him through breaths, holds, easing into the next pose with a grace Nathan can’t hope to mimic. He follows, though: bends and breathes into it and something just clicks. The muscles in his back release; he sinks into the stretch and a little bit of tension siphons off his bones and all the sudden his throat feels tight and there’s this _wave _of something he can’t describe and it’s threatening to bowl him over.

Duke’s beside him the second his breath hitches, wearing this expression like he knew this was coming. His big hands are warm where they find Nathan’s chest to steady him. “Easy, big guy,” he murmurs, “It happens. Keep breathing, come on. One, two, three, four—hold, two, three, four. You got it. Relax.”

Nathan’s shaking. He lets Duke help him down to the floor and buries his head in his hands. He’s not crying, not exactly, but there’s something awful and beautiful and cathartic rattling around in his chest and he hates it.

Duke reaches out to ruffle his hair. “You did good, Nate.” He sits down beside him, close but not touching.

Touch is hard for Nathan, these days. His feeling came back, and all of the sudden Nathan could hardly stand being near the two people he wanted to feel the most. Before, Audrey’s touch was a light in the dark. Now, Duke and Audrey’s hands are too often just more static in the white noise of pain his body has become. He hates thinking of them that way.

Duke pulls him from his thoughts with a quick, gentle kiss to his temple and passes him a water bottle. “C’mon,” he murmurs, “Rehydrate and then I’ll go get the hard stuff.”

Below deck, Duke pulls out his phone and texts Audrey. _You busy? At the Rouge. He needs us._

Duke comes back with a bottle of bourbon and three glasses, but Nathan doesn’t really think about it. He takes the one offered and they settle into a long quiet, watching the sun go down over the water.

An eternity passes in silence, and slowly but surely the tremor starts to leave Nathan’s hands and the bourbon warms him up and he forgets, just a little, about the aches that never seem to stop.

“I fucked my back up, right after I left Haven,” Duke says, his voice no louder than the wind and waves. “Sailed into a killer storm and got thrown around on deck. Slipped. Practically snapped myself in half on the mast.”

Nathan looks up at him, wincing. “Shit.”

“Yeah,” Duke laughs. “I was in _Spain_. Million miles from home. Didn’t know anybody who wasn’t—y’know. A smuggler. Didn’t exactly have _friends _in town. I had some money saved up, thank god, but uh, not much else. So, I got out of the hospital and still had a bunch of mandatory bed rest and I fucking hated it. Everything hurt. It didn’t feel like _my _body. Not how I remembered my body, at least.”

Nathan doesn’t have to say how familiar that last part sounds; Duke already knows. Duke’s always known him better than Nathan gave him credit for.

Duke takes a sip of his bourbon and watches the strained expression cross Nathan’s face and disappear before he continues. “My PT was the one who told me to try yoga. She said it’d help me feel like me again.” He lifts his glass in a pantomime of a toast. “And it did.”

Audrey’s voice catches Nathan by surprise, but Duke just grins. “Must have sucked,” she says as she climbs up onto the deck from the pier, “going through physical therapy on your own.”

Duke laughs—stands, pulls up a chair, and pours Audrey a glass. He dips down to kiss the corner of her mouth and she lights up just a little. Nathan tries not to be jealous, but he misses the simplicity of touch without pain. He misses _them_, even though they haven’t left.

“Took you long enough,” Duke teases before sitting back down beside Nathan. “You get lost?”

Audrey rolls her eyes and grumbles, “Oh yeah, sorry, I forgot to _teleport_.” Duke beams at her.

“But uh, to answer your question,” he says, back on track, “Yeah. It was a pretty shit time.” He manages a bashful laugh and bumps shoulders with Nathan and admits, “You know, believe it or not, I kept wishing your annoying ass was there to yell at me. But you, uh. You know. Said no.”

“Yeah, cause he wasn’t a huge idiot,” Audrey teases, her voice nothing but fond. She nudges Duke with her foot. “The hell were you _thinking_, sailing to _Spain _fresh out of high school?”

Duke huffs and makes a show about acting defensive. He counts on his fingers dramatically when he drawls, “Uh, _well_, I was thinking this is a weird, little, backwards town and my family sucked, and—” At this point, he drops the fake outrage (can’t keep it up anyway, with how his smile keeps breaking through) and says, “Oh yeah, and this stuck up jerk I’d been sweet on like my whole life had just shot me down. So, you know, what’d I have to lose?”

Audrey laughs and teases, "You were such a cutie in high school, I don’t know how he resisted you."

"I _know_, right?"

Nathan's been quiet for a while, just laughing softly at the jokes and listening to the story, caught up in his own head. Duke watches him for a second before clapping a hand against Nathan’s chest and telling Audrey, "Nate had a big breakthrough, today! You should have seen his cobra pose; it was beautiful. Right, Nathan?"

“Yeah,” Nathan echoes, not really listening, “Beautiful.”

They’re all quiet for a moment before Audrey, very gently, asks, "Are you doing okay?"

Nathan doesn’t look away from the water. The sun disappeared a few minutes ago, but there’s still a glow lingering at the base of the horizon. He thinks of how badly he’d missed the feeling of the ocean and how little interest it holds for him now. Finally, softly, he says, "No."

Duke nods. He’s gentle when he wraps an arm around Nathan’s shoulders. Nathan leans into it in spite of himself. “I’m sorry,” Nathan confesses, his voice cracked down the center, “I miss you.” Audrey’s hand finds one of his and he holds it tight.

“It’s okay, big guy,” Duke murmurs, his face turned into Nathan’s hair. “We know.”

It’s the longest he’s let either of them touch him in days. He doesn’t move for a long, long while. The breeze kisses his face and it’s—

Nice.

Easy.


End file.
